


The Pain, the Angel, and I

by Maxrim



Category: Original Work
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-19
Updated: 2013-02-19
Packaged: 2017-11-29 20:23:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/691062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maxrim/pseuds/Maxrim
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A small story that I wrote, probably could have done better.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Pain, the Angel, and I

Mind you, I tend to ramble on when I tell my story, so do make sure you wish to hear it before I embark on this tale. It is only natural that I do though, as it is what defines me. You do? Excellent.  
As far as the backstory goes, you should know, I was born to a normal enough family, of course, no family is truly normal, just as none of the individuals that make them up are, but my family wasn’t remarkable in much of any way to someone who hardly knew us. I had two brothers in addition to my parents, one older, one younger, and we got along well enough, when we weren’t at one another’s throats, that is. I suppose that I was always the odd one out, the child who would say the oddest things, at the oddest times. I never slept well, and I never ate well. The important tidbit of information here is, from your perspective, that I suffered from a pain.  
A kind of pain that gave no reprieve. From the time that I could talk, I told anyone who asked that it hurt badly. I asked anyone who would listen “Please help me, I cannot handle this any longer.” and they would tell me, “Here is your medication, now rest.” I would take pills, of growing intensity over the years, and they would not help. I went to some and asked “Worldly solutions leave me unaffected, please pray for me, I need God’s help.” and they would pray, whether long and hard or quick and meaningless, they would pray. However, this did not help either.  
As the pain only worsened over time, I lost happiness. I felt no need to have friends of any sort, and I felt no need to live. At one point, they decided that I bore the burden of a demon, preying upon my spirit, the source of the pain. But the pain wasn’t something to have a source. At least not one that could be found. I lost hope.

Further down the line, at the point where I was aging on 16 years, I had grown numb. Not to the pain, no, the pain is not something that you can harden to, not something that you can ignore, or grow any barrier against. But I had grown numb to the world, and even to myself, I didn’t know who I was, I knew only that it hurt.

I hadn’t slept for days, just as you haven’t now. I hadn’t sought help for some long time, for I saw no hope. But hope is remarkable, as even when not seen, even when lost in entirety, it is present. My hope shined bright, hidden away through my loss of it, but bright. As a ray of my hope escaped from the darker realms of my mind, where the pain nested for oh so long, I prayed. I didn’t pray long. I didn’t pray hard. But I said a few words, not any of which I remember now, not many of which I’m likely allowed to speak in my present predicament, but I said a few words.  
Nothing happened, of course. At least, not immediately. Later, now that’s when things got interesting, but then it’s likely a good idea to stay linear, at least for now. Oh, what’s that? You wish to move on. Well, I suppose that it’ll all be very well either way. Later.  
I stopped. Something was around me. It kept me from ending it there, and it shone bright. Something of a golden light, I thought then. It wasn’t, it wasn’t a golden light, but that’s what I thought it was then. It was great, and yet terrible, I myself was quite frightened.  
“I am an angel of the Lord.” it bellowed, sounding more or less like a thousand claps of thunder in the span of a few words. “You bear a grave burden, but you have borne it well so far, and you are wished to continue. Great things lay in the realm of your possible future.” I was awestruck. I listened to his words and I obeyed.  
I kept on through life, hoping, finally hoping, for some further word on this great future that had been spoken of. I continued on for some few weeks, as the pain continued to wear at me, consuming the fraction of my self that had been set free in the presence of the angel. I prayed again and received nothing in answer.  
Finally, it appeared before me again. I had thought much on what to say, what to ask it, but when it came again, I did not speak. “Through faith and obedience, your burden may lift. The Lord wills you to go to the people.” And just like that, the angel disappeared again.  
I obeyed, I went to the people. I shouted from the rooftops. I preached and I prayed. I claimed to herald something great. Little did I know, I heralded only possibility. After months of work, of prayer and worship, I experienced another vision. Though this one was of another nature.  
It came in the form which I least expected. It came as an exact replica, and made me wonder if I wasn’t the one formed after it. I looked into my eyes, grey with a ring of yellowy green, and stood silent. I knew that it was nothing from above, it was trying to deceive me.  
“Well, I must say, you were made quite well after my image.” my voice spoke, erupting unnaturally out of my mouth, but not stemming from my mind. It came from that which was before me.  
“You are a demon, correct?” I tested, fully expecting a lie. Deceit is the way of demons, or so I believed.  
“Yes.” it answered smugly, “surprised at the truth? Don’t be, you should know, I am not just a demon. At least not to you.”  
“Oh, and what are you?” I asked, confused.  
“Why, can’t you tell? I AM YOUR GOD!” it laughed, my laugh, in the most hateful way. “Oh don’t you see? You were made in my IMAGE! I do believe that it says something along those lines in that book of yours, each stems from it’s own kind, does it not?”  
“I will not listen to your lies. I am a man of God.” The pain grew stronger.  
I denied it again and again, using the name of the Lord to attempt to banish it, deny it, just as you did, but as I tried, the pain grew unbearable. I fell to ground, and watched my face standing over me.   
“They aren’t going to help you. The forces of ‘above’ and all that nonsense think that you are weak, and will not lift a finger. See? Where’s your little babysitter angel now?” He punched me, hard. My neck popped as his fist, just like mine, collided with my jaw, just like his. “I, on the other hand, am quite capable of freeing you. If you aren’t freed, you should know that your pain will last even after your body dies. You are, of course, going to die with your body, the heavens won’t accept a demonic little bitch like you. The pain will follow you into oblivion, and the infinite will resound with it. But if I free you, you will be allowed to live the rest of your many mortal days without it. What do you think?”  
“I think that you’re a lying son of a bitch” I announced, but that’s not what went through my mind. In my mind I begged. In my mind I demanded that he do what he claimed he could. And that’s what he heard. A paper rolled out from literally up his sleeve, a knife with it. His hands laid them before me and spoke.  
“This is our contract. The price is a mere technicality, anything further would break the bond that the words hold. You sign here, in your blood. Here, feel free to use my supply.” He held his wrist out, for me to open.  
I shouldn’t have. I knew it than and I know it now. But I did. I would have done anything for the chance at even a moment of freedom, and I suppose that I did get that, just as you might one day. I wrote out the letters, those that are no longer mine. And it bound me.  
For an instant, I was held by two binds, that of the pain and that of the contract. But then glory filled me. I was freed. I felt no pain. And then glory filled me. In quite a different sense the second time round. The glory of heaven’s might. Smiting me, I suppose. I died.

The pain was back, my face laughing at me. He explained the situation. That I was a fool for trusting him. He told me how to truly free myself from the pain, and I suppose that I’m a fool for trusting him. Anyway, he told me how to pass it to someone else, to curse them with my burden. It involves their death.  
And I’ve never much liked you.


End file.
